Boise's Marc Johnson heads six-office PR firm

By Lora Volkert

IDAHO BUSINESS REVIEW

Marc Johnson, a partner in the Boise office of the Gallatin Group, was recently promoted to president of the six-office regional public relations firm.

The Gallatin Group has offices in Boise, Seattle, Portland, Spokane, Helena, Mont., and Washington, D.C. The fast-growing firm has hired six people in four offices since January, bringing employment to 32.

The firm handles public relations for companies facing complex public affairs and issues management matters.

One of its biggest Idaho clients was Ida-West Energy, a subsidiary of Idacorp, that faced strong local opposition to a power plant it wanted to build in Middleton and required cooperation from several regulatory and planning agencies. Although the plant was eventually put on hold, Gallatin helped it win approval from the Canyon County Commission and all the permits it needed.

Gallatin’s clients include Formation Capital Corp., which plans to develop a cobalt mine near Salmon, and Pocatello-based AMI Semiconductor, which is lobbying the Legislature for more education funding and trying to increase public awareness of its semiconductor products.

“You just don’t get much done in terms of something that’s going to require public approval and public support without communication,” Johnson said.

Johnson graduated from journalism school at South Dakota State University in 1975. His interest in public affairs began with an internship to cover the South Dakota Legislature for a Brookings, S.D., public radio station.

A news director whom Johnson worked with in Rapid City, S.D., offered him a job at KBCI Channel 2 in Boise.

“I had never been to Idaho before, so I loaded up my U-Haul trailer and came west,” he said.

Johnson worked for 10 years in television. That included two years at KBCI, primarily covering city and state government, and eight years at Idaho Public Television, where he developed the public affairs program Idaho Reports.

In 1986 Johnson joined the gubernatorial campaign of Democrat Cecil Andrus, who was Idaho’s governor from 1971 to 1977 and Secretary of the Interior under President Carter. Andrus was elected for two more terms (1987-95), and Johnson served as his press secretary and later his chief of staff.

“I think, like a lot of folks who cover politics, you like to see what it’s like on the other side,” Johnson said.

As a political journalist and as Andrus’ campaign spokesman, Johnson got to know Chris Carlson, who was Andrus’ press secretary during his first terms as governor and Secretary of the Interior. Carlson became one of the founders of the Gallatin Group and encouraged Johnson to join the firm. He joined as a partner in 1994.

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